How to pick an Advisor
As you know from a previous blog “Mentoring Takes Skill”; the relationships you build with your advisor should be dynamic, personal and fluid. Your tenure as a trainee (graduate or postdoc) will be heavily influenced by their presence, thereby making it imperative that the relationship be a positive one.
Academic advisors are meant to counsel students through their course of study. It’s not the advisor’s course, it is YOUR course. An advisor’s job description is to guide you in finding a project, secure funding, give you scientific advice to strengthen your projects, provide resources and strategies to progress after completing the degree. Remember, graduate school is a process, not the end destination, and a successful advisor knows that advising students is an integral component of their success. So put your advisor on your team, choose one that is going to make you excel and don’t be afraid to shine.
Ultimately, you want an advisor that promotes your development as a scientist. You must first, however, have some insight into your needs as a person and scholar. Contemplate why you want to pursue a given path. Be raw, honest with yourself and set goals. There are many reasons to attend graduate school, or pursue a postdoc, and honing in on why you want to attend will help you to make the most of your experience. Surround yourself with mentors and peers who want to assist in your success. Do you strive to master a new lab skill? Then maybe you should pick someone who is just starting their lab, it’s likely that they are still working in the lab, and can teach you new lab skills. Discuss ownership ideas and publishing boundaries at the start.
What if you already have solid lab skills, but you want to explore other science skills, like experimental design, bioinformatics, modeling, successful grant writing, publishing, etc.? Then maybe you pick an advisor who has more big picture ideas and is willing to help you in other aspects of science, (i.e. you experimental design, successful grant writing, publishing, etc…). If you’re looking for some big wig in the field, stop, they’re likely white, privileged and don’t give a damn about you or your science. In addition, if your advisor gives you anything less than their job description or is too self absorbed, then they are trash.
When I started my PhD program, I began in a different lab. My old advisor was big pictured, mostly supportive, passively condescending, and a micromanager, not my type. And after some time in the lab, I insisted that I didn’t like the project I was given. I wasn’t super passionate about it. I was doing in-situ hybridization techniques, which I swore to myself I was never going to do, and yet, there I was staining things purple. I was miserable, and my motto has always been “be in the pursuit of happiness”. So really I had 2 options, 1) Quit (which I really didn’t want to do, since I worked my f-ing ass off to get here and it had only been 3 months!) or 2) find a new advisor.
The different types of Academic Advisors:
The Micromanager, an advisor who judges your experience by creating specific deadlines that you must adhere to no matter what. Typically they do not include your thoughts or life in these arbitrary deadlines.
The Hands-Off type, the one who rarely sees you, but is successful at grant writing and knowledgeable, if you can find them.
The Big pictured type, but “Let’s Hold your hand through the Process”, usually patient, but has a particular style. They typically support whatever you need, just not financially.
The Not so effective communicator, or leader, or anything really.
The Friendly one, usually the one that doesn’t like to talk about science with you.
The Condescending one, usually too good to listen to or talks down to you. These are the ones that accept diversity students that come with their own money, but don’t actually want to advise them.
Pointers from personal experience:
Advisors come in many different flavors, so listen to your gut, and feel the vibe. Advisors will be a key component in your journey, but you’re going to need MORE than your advisor to be on your team. This is good! Identify people in the department who could be a potential ally. You want a committee that is going to be in your corner and go up to bat for you, if needed. Imagine that your degree is like building a company, you're solving problems, pushing boundaries, and creating a product at the end that will leverage you into your dream profession. Who is on your Board of Directors? Who are the people that you can trust?
I should have asked MORE questions! Whoever you choose, you should always ask:
How many graduate students have you had?
Have any of your students finished their PhDs or Masters program?
How long did it take them to graduate?
How many of your students are Black, Indigenous, Person of Color (BIPOC)? Did they graduate, and how long did it take them to graduate? Let’s be real, BIPOC students lack the advisor’s they need and many leave before they complete their degree.
Does your advisor value diversity in STEM and how? This is important. Yes, even old white men can value diversity and their actions should confirm this.
It’s important to ask your advisor, “What have you done to increase diversity in STEM?” Based on their answer you can infer if they are an “ally or all lies”. REMEMBER it is okay to ask: “Do you have any Diversity Equity Inclusion training? If so, from when and where?”
More importantly, you should ask yourself, how are YOU going to get paid? Do YOU have funding? Does your potential advisor have funding? Where do THEY get their funds from? WHEN was the last time they got funding? That’s important.
If you know your advisor has been in academia for a while, but it’s been a long time (+6 years) since their last big grant, then you know that they had one big idea and then never blossomed after that. Likely a dud, or potentially half baked. You can find this on their CV or ask them. If they have been successful in getting grants continuously, maybe in the last 3 years, then maybe they're good at writing grants. Ask them if they will help you write a grant to get funding? You can also gauge someone's character by asking what their lifestyle is like? And what their hobbies are like?
Remember to talk to other members of their lab graduate students, or previous graduate students/postdocs, undergrads. They will be more honest with you, especially if the conversation takes place outside of the lab. It would be even better if your future advisor said, “Hey, talk to my students and ask them what they think of me?” By doing this you gain two valuable pieces of information: 1) what your advisor is like from a different perspective and 2) what kind of people you will meet and potentially work with. Again, feel their vibe, it’s important that you feel safe and included.
So that's what I did. I looked at my department’s website and started looking at descriptions of other advisors, looked at their CV, and read their papers. For me personally, I was looking for clues, I wanted to share something in common besides science. I think it makes the relationships more dynamic. I ended up choosing an advisor(s) that valued the outdoors, ocean, diversity in STEM and were successful at publishing and grant writing; plus their graduate students had good things to say, Eureka! Maybe we should start an advisor review page... call it WOC Advisors Yelp Review. STEM has a fundamental problem in not supporting their BIPOC community, and there is a lack of mentorship and skills that they need to be effective, but there are good advisors out there!!! I got lucky and made connections with good people who I can trust. If I learned one thing being in graduate school is that you have to be passionate about the things you work on, listen to your initial vibes, and be courageous enough to do something about it. Now to follow my own advice, and go find myself a postdoc mentor...
If you need help in starting an email to a new advisor, here is a way to start:
Subject Title: Space in your lab? New team member
Hello Dr. [XX],
My name is [XYX]. Me and my current advisor are scientifically incompatible, I was hoping we could meet to discuss a future in your lab…[I AM INTERESTED BECAUSE; AND THIS IS HOW WE COULD INTEGRATE...]
I look forward to hearing back from you.
Kind regards,
[XYX]